Teleost fish have a nociceptive system and likely perceive pain. This warrants the development of analgesic protocols both for experimental surgery and for various husbandry procedures. Morphine is the standard analgesic against which the efficacy of other analgesics is assessed, and is the analgesic that has been most used in fish. The aims of this study were to describe the pharmacokinetics o...

Metabolic rate depression (MRD) has long been proposed as the key metabolic strategy of hypoxic survival, but surprisingly, the effects of changes in hypoxic O2 tensions (PwO2 ) on MRD are largely unexplored. We simultaneously measured the O2 consumption rate (ṀO2 ) and metabolic heat of goldfish using calorespirometry to test the hypothesis that MRD is employed at hypoxic PwO2  values and init...

Male-typical reproductive behaviors vary greatly between different species of fishes with androgens playing a variety of roles that appear especially important in the gonochorist cypriniform fishes. The goldfish is an important model for the cypriniformes and while it is clear that male goldfish are fully feminized by prostaglandin F2α(PGF2α), it is not clear whether females will exhibit normal...

Our recent study showed that monocrotophos (MCP) pesticide disrupted the hypothalamic-pituitary-thyroid (HPT) axis in male goldfish (Carassius auratus); however, the effects of MCP on the thyroid system in female goldfish are remain unclear. In the present study, plasma thyroid hormone (TH) and thyroid-stimulating hormone (TSH) levels were evaluated in female goldfish exposed to 0.01, 0.10, and...

The roles of nitric oxide synthase activity (NOS), nitrite and myoglobin (Mb) in the regulation of myocardial function during hypoxia were examined in trout and goldfish, a hypoxia-intolerant and hypoxia-tolerant species, respectively. We measured the effect of NOS inhibition, adrenaline and nitrite on the O(2) consumption rate and isometric twitch force development in electrically paced ventri...

ABSTRACT Goldfish are one of a few species able to avoid cellular damage during month-long periods in severely hypoxic environments. By suppressing action potentials excitatory glutamatergic neurons, the goldfish brain decreases its overall energy expenditure. Coincident with reductions O2 availability is natural decrease reactive oxygen (ROS) generation, which has been proposed function as par...

The expression of the neurofilament proteins of the goldfish visual pathway reflects the degeneration and regeneration of the optic nerve after nerve crush. To monitor these processes, monoclonal antibodies (mAb) were generated to the intermediate filament proteins of this pathway. The predominant goldfish visual pathway intermediate filament proteins have a molecular weight of 58K and can be s...

As an essential hormone regulating gonads in vertebrates, the biosynthesis and secretion of follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH) is controlled by a variety of endocrine and paracrine factors in both mammalian and non-mammalian vertebrates. Activin was initially discovered in the ovary for its specific stimulation of FSH secretion by the pituitary cells. Our earlier studies in fish have shown that...

With oxygen deprivation, the mammalian brain undergoes hyper-activity and neuronal death while this does not occur in the anoxia-tolerant goldfish (Carassius auratus). Anoxic survival of the goldfish may rely on neuromodulatory mechanisms to suppress neuronal hyper-excitability. As γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) is the major inhibitory neurotransmitter in the brain, we decided to investigate its po...

In goldfish it has been shown that ethambutol shifts the threshold for wavelength discrimination without affecting the absolute sensitivity of the cones. In this study we demonstrate that a similar colour vision disturbance occurs in tuberculosis patients treated with ethambutol. After 2 months of ethambutol treatment, chromatic discrimination was measured with a computerized forced two choice ...